United Kingdom, The Warminster Thing (UFO)

In the mid-1960s a sleepy Wiltshire town became the unlikely epicentre of a UFO phenomenon.

Warminster, in West Wiltshire, became known globally for what was enigmatically called “The Thing”. The Thing took many forms by those who claimed to have observed it between 1965 and 1977.

The first sign of The Thing was during the Christmas of 1964, when residents heard a loud, unidentifiable whine. The strange sightings were reported in the Warminster Journal. Local journalist Arthur Shuttlewood was instrumental in making the phenomenon national news and in one year more than 1000 sightings of unidentified flying objects were recorded.

They continued to be seen on a regular basis between 1965 and 1977, and in many ways formed a key chapter of the 1960s . Although there have been few sightings in recent years, Warminster is still seen by many as synonymous with UFOs.

With the army based on nearby Salisbury Plain, Warminster is well known as a military town.

This gave rise to the theory that visitors from outer space could very well have been mistaken military aircraft.

But believers shrugged off this theory believing that the military were one of the reasons Warminster had been chosen for visitations. Whatever the reason for the coming of The Thing, it has certainly put Warminster on the map.